SUNBURY -- There is no clear and convincing evidence to show that Richard C. Curran intended to kill his wife, the defendant's defense attorney told 12 jurors Wednesday in arguing for a third-degree murder conviction that would spare his client the death penalty.

Those jurors will begin deliberations today in Northumberland County Court on whether the former police officer is guilty of first- or third-degree murder in the August 2005 slaying of his wife, Tina, at Shamokin Area Community Hospital.

The 34-year-old Shamokin man could face the death penalty if convicted of first-degree murder. Murder in the first degree, Curran's defense attorney, Karl Rominger of Carlisle, told the jury, means there was a conscious desire or intent to kill.

Murder in the third degree, he said, includes no specific intent to kill.

"Twelve shots," District Attorney Anthony Rosini said in his closing argument, "is evidence of intent."

Tina Curran was shot 12 times in the parking lot of the hospital just before 11 a.m. Aug. 24, 2005. Her husband was caught later that day trying to enter Canada near Niagara Falls, N.Y.

A number of questions about Curran's state of mind should be weighed, Rominger said.

He was not prepared to flee, because he had no clean clothes or identification. He and his former wife had been battling over child support issues for some time and, as a trained police officer, Curran would not have attacked her in broad daylight at her place of employment.

Because there was no reconstruction of the crime, Rominger said, no one knows the exact sequence of events.

"We can't be sure what happened without that reconstruction," he said.

"Use only your reason," he asked the jury. "There is plausible circumstantial evidence for third-degree murder, and there is plausible circumstantial evidence for first-degree murder."

Third-degree murder, Rosini said, involves knowledge of the risk of harm to the victim.

"The defendant was mad about money," he said. "He was trying to avoid support payments. Money is the motive."

Using a photograph from the autopsy, Rosini pointed out that Tina Curran was hit by seven of the 12 shots fired by her husband, including three in the back and one shot fired through her neck.

"He intended to kill her," he said.